“Of course!—that’ll do splendidly! Mr. Sorell will see, at once, it’s the right thing for me, and my happiness. I can’t be turned out—I really can’t! So it’s settled. Yes—it’s settled!—or it will be directly—and nobody need bother any more—need they? But—there’s one condition.”
Ewen Hooper looked at her in silence.
“That you—you and Nora—go to Borne this Christmas time, this very Christmas, Uncle Ewen! I think I put in enough—and I can give you such a lot of letters!”
She laughed joyously, though she was very near crying.
“I have never been able to go to Home—Or Athens—never!” he said, in a low voice, as he sat down again at his table. All the thwarted hopes, all the sordid cares of years were in the quiet words.
“Well, now you’re going!” said Connie shyly. “Oh, that would be ripping! You’ll promise me that—you must, please!”
Silence again. She approached Nora, timidly.
“Nora!”
Nora rose. Her face was stained with tears.
“It’s all wrong,” she said heavily—“it’s all wrong. But—I give in. What I said was a lie. There is nothing else in the world that we could possibly do.”